Identity First

A facilitator-led leadership program that helps your team build organizational culture from the inside out — without needing a consultant in the room.

Identity First is the flagship program in the CLTR Foundations suite. It gives your leadership team the framework, facilitator materials, and implementation runway to do the foundational culture work most organizations skip. Three lessons. Three working sessions. One clear result — a shared, named, behavior-anchored organizational identity your leadership team has built together.

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Culture, by design.

Insight that drives your next move.

Culture, by design. Insight that drives your next move.

Every organization already has a culture. The only question is whether it's intentional or accidental.

Most companies talk about culture. Fewer build it on purpose.

You already know culture shapes how your team communicates, makes decisions, treats clients, and responds when things get hard. You know the difference between an organization whose values live in behavior and one whose values live on a wall poster. And you probably know what the second one is costing you — in retention, in decision quality, in the energy your people carry home at the end of the day.

What most leadership teams don't have is a way to actually do the foundational work — without paying a consultant to walk them through it.

That's exactly what Identity First was built for.

If this sounds like your organization

Your team is good, but your culture is unwritten

Your leadership team would describe your values differently if asked separately

You've tried a values exercise before and watched it fade within a quarter

You're entering a growth phase, transition, or restructure and need a foundation that holds under change

Recurring people issues feel structural rather than personal

You want to lead this work yourself, with your team, instead of outsourcing it to a consultant

Then you need more than a values exercise.

Most leadership teams don't need another engagement survey or another set of aspirational language written by someone outside the room.

You need:

  • A structured, facilitator-led program you can run with your leadership team on your own timeline

  • A framework that moves your team from identity through values through behaviors — so the values you name are values your team can actually recognize and rely on

  • Facilitator materials designed so any senior leader on your team can lead the sessions

  • A six-month implementation arc that continues the work after the sessions end

  • A foundation that reduces exposure across retention, execution, and leadership alignment

That’s exactly what Identity first delivers.

What is Identity First?

Identity First is the flagship program of the CLTR Foundations suite — a facilitator-led leadership program designed to be run inside your organization, by your leadership team, with your people.

The program walks your team through the same foundational culture work CLTR uses with private consulting clients — restructured as a self-guided program your leadership team owns and runs internally. Three lessons. Three working sessions. Every piece of the program is designed so that a senior leader on your team can facilitate without a background in HR or organizational development.

You facilitate. Your team builds the identity together. CLTR gives you everything you need to lead the room.

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Inside Identity First

Each purchase of Identity First includes:

  • Three fully-designed lesson decks with detailed facilitator notes

    • Lesson 1: What Culture Really Is

    • Lesson 2: Organizational Identity & Core Values Workshop

    • Lesson 3: Turning Values Into Behaviors

  • Participant workbooks for your entire team
    Reflection prompts and workshop exercises for every team member, delivered as designed printable PDFs

  • The Outro closing module
    A designed workbook that hands the work off to the leadership team with a synthesis of what your team built, common patterns to watch for, and the six-month implementation arc that follows the sessions

  • The six-month implementation tracker
    A printable and digital tool for holding the work steady after the sessions end

  • Lifetime access to program updates
    As materials evolve, your organization keeps access to the current version of every deliverable

How Identity First works

  • You receive the complete program library immediately after purchase — lesson decks, facilitator notes, participant workbooks, the Outro module, and the six-month implementation tracker.

  • Run each lesson at the pace that fits your organization — three consecutive weeks, a monthly rhythm, or a two-day intensive built into a leadership offsite. Sessions typically run 90 minutes to two hours each.

  • The Outro module hands the work off to your leadership team with a structured path for embedding the values into day-to-day operations across the six months that follow.

Why Identity First is different

Most values exercises stop at language. They give your team a set of words and a productive afternoon — and by the next quarter, the words are background noise.

Identity First goes further because it was built inside real consulting engagements. The same three-lesson arc CLTR uses privately with organizations paying five-figure engagements is now restructured for leadership teams to run themselves. You get the framework, the facilitator materials, the participant workbooks, and the implementation runway — designed together, so nothing gets lost between the workshop and the work that follows.

And because CLTR was founded by a former employment attorney with over a decade of litigation experience, Identity First is built with a rare dual lens — the human layer and the structural layer, seen together. Culture that reduces exposure across retention, execution, and leadership alignment, not just morale.

Who Identity First is for

The Identity First program is designed for founder-led and owner-led organizations, executive leadership teams, senior leaders responsible for people and culture, and HR leaders working closely with executives.

It's especially valuable for organizations in a growth phase, leadership transition, post-merger integration, or any period of meaningful change where culture needs to hold clearly under pressure.

Who it’s not for

Identity First may not be the right fit if you're looking for a values poster, a quick morale survey, or a program you can hand off to HR without leadership presence. The program asks something of the leadership team — modeling the standard, holding the line, and staying with the six-month implementation arc after the sessions end.

The Investment

$1299

Identity First is a one-time purchase for full organizational access to the flagship CLTR Foundations program.

You'll receive the complete program library immediately — three lesson decks with detailed facilitator notes, participant workbooks for your entire team, the Outro closing module, the six-month implementation tracker, and lifetime access to program updates.

Your next step.

If you're ready to build the culture your organization has been meaning to name, the next step is simple.

Get Identity First

Enroll your leadership team and receive the full program library within minutes.

Want to go deeper than the program?

For some leadership teams, Identity First is the complete foundation and the implementation arc carries them from there.

For others, it becomes the starting point of a longer relationship — where CLTR comes in as strategic counsel, uses the CLTR Culture Audit as a diagnostic for the work Identity First surfaces, or partners with your organization on the deeper systems redesign that Identity First reveals is ready.

If you'd like to explore what working with CLTR could look like beyond the Identity First program, you're welcome to reach out.

Explore Working With CLTR

Identity First:
Frequently Asked Questions

  • Identity First is built for leadership teams that want to do foundational organizational culture work themselves without hiring an outside facilitator. That includes founders and owners of small-to-mid-sized companies, executive teams inside larger organizations, and HR leaders working closely with executive leadership. The program is especially useful for organizations in a growth phase, leadership transition, or period of change where culture needs to be named and reinforced clearly.

  • The CLTR Foundations program suite is built as a series of facilitator-led modules that leadership teams run with their people internally. Each module is a self-contained program with everything you need to lead the sessions on your own timeline — slide decks, facilitator notes, participant workbooks, and a closing implementation module. Identity First is the flagship module of the suite, focused on organizational identity, core values, and turning values into behaviors your team can actually recognize.

  • The slide decks are delivered as designed PDF files that you can display in any meeting format — in-person, hybrid, or fully remote. Every slide includes detailed facilitator notes written to be spoken aloud, so any senior leader on your team can facilitate the sessions without a background in HR or organizational development. As designed, the program is fully plug and play — the facilitator script is complete, and you can run a session by leading directly from the materials.

    That said, we always recommend the person facilitating runs through the materials at least once beforehand. Not because you need to rewrite anything, but because the more a facilitator can make the sessions their own — adding a story, an example from your team's actual experience, or a turn of phrase that sounds like you — the more the room tends to connect with the person leading it. The program is complete as designed. Making it your own just deepens what's already there.

  • Yes. Every Identity First purchase includes participant workbooks for your entire team, delivered as designed printable PDFs. You can print copies for in-person sessions or share the files digitally for remote and hybrid teams. The Outro closing module and the six-month implementation tracker are also delivered as printable resources you can revisit throughout the year that follows.

  • Your one-time purchase includes the complete program library — three lesson decks with detailed facilitator notes, participant workbooks for your entire team, the Outro closing module for leadership, the six-month implementation tracker, and lifetime access to program updates as materials evolve.

  • Immediately. After purchase, you receive access to all program materials right away. You can begin facilitating on your team's timeline — whether that's next week, next month, or built into your next leadership offsite.

  • Identity First is a facilitator-led program you run inside your own organization. There is no live session with CLTR. Every module is designed for leadership teams to run internally, wherever your team already meets — in the office, on Zoom, at an offsite, or a combination of all three.

  • Most values exercises stop at language. Teams walk out with a polished set of words but no shared picture of what those words look like in a meeting, in a moment of disagreement, when a concern is raised, or when a client is on the other end of the line. Identity First is built on the belief that values live in behavior, not language. The program takes your leadership team from identity through values through behaviors — so the values you name are values your team can actually recognize and rely on.

  • The three sessions can be run at whatever pace works for your organization. Most leadership teams run them across three consecutive weeks or once a month over a quarter. Sessions typically run 90 minutes to two hours each. The six-month implementation arc that follows is designed to be integrated into your regular leadership rhythm without adding significant time.

  • Identity First is a self-paced facilitation program that your leadership team runs internally with your own people. You purchase once, receive all materials immediately, and lead the sessions on your timeline. There are no scheduled cohorts or live calls with CLTR included in the base program.

  • The CLTR Culture Audit is a diagnostic — it gives you data about where your culture is now, benchmarked against peers, with financial impact analysis and focused priorities for action. Identity First is a program — it walks your leadership team through the foundational work of building an intentional culture from the ground up. Many organizations use them together, with the Culture Audit surfacing where you are today and Identity First giving you the framework to build from there.

  • Yes. The single-organization purchase covers your organization however it's structured. If you're a larger organization interested in running Identity First across multiple business units, subsidiaries, or a network of portfolio companies, reach out to discuss extended organizational licensing.

  • Identity First was designed by Jessamyn Jones, founder of CLTR Collective. Jessamyn spent over a decade practicing employment law on the employer side before founding CLTR to work with organizations on the culture-level work that most legal issues trace back to. The program is built on the same foundational framework CLTR uses with private consulting clients.

  • By the end of the three sessions, your leadership team will have named a clear organizational identity, surfaced a set of core values that reflect your team at its best, and translated each value into behaviors your team can see and rely on in real situations — meetings, moments of disagreement, when concerns are raised, and in client interactions. The six-month implementation arc that follows the sessions is designed to embed the work into the day-to-day so it becomes lived culture rather than a workshop artifact.

  • Because Identity First delivers the complete program library immediately upon purchase, all sales are final. If you're unsure whether Identity First is the right fit for your organization, reach out before purchasing and we'll help you think it through honestly.